The '14 driver transfer discussion/speculation thread

No, it wasn't rude. He was being hectored by an over-anxious engineer who was letting the stress of the team's actually being in a position to win a race for the first time in like 4 years get the better of him. And for the love of pete, the actual quote was, "Leave me alone, I know what to do."

 

That's not an excuse. There wasn't a single sign of stress in the engineer's voice, and he was clearly sending the message as a response to readings the team had received. Raikkonen, on the other hand, snapped at him.

This is typical of the attitude I've encountered from Raikkonen apologists, albeit relatively minor; there were some who would defend him endlessly, regardless of what he does, even if a video emerged of him torturing puppies. To their mind, it's never Raikkonen's fault. If he snapped at an engineer, the engineer had it coming. If he caused a first-lap wipe-out, it's the track designer's fault for including a drainage gully. If he only produces two decent laps in fourteen Grands Prix, it's the team's fault for giving him a bad car.

Raikkonen wouldn't even be World Champion were it not for McLaren's driver mismanagement. He's not a legend of the sport - he's a guy who was in the right place at the right time. He is over-rated and seriously underperforming. If Ferrari are as serious about reform as they claim they are, they'll fire him. And the sooner he is gone, the better off the sport will be.

 

to be fair 2005 was easily raikkonens title if the car had any kind of reliability.

 

Yes Räikkönen has faults a lot of them. But he's a legend of the sport as is Alonso, I hate Alonso but I still agree that he's a legend. Räikkönen is exact opposite for Alonso unlike him Räikkönen doesn't make any excuses if he drives badly (which he has done a lot this season)he admits that and doesn't blame the car or the team. It's the fans that do it. Over-rated, maybe. Underperforming, definitely. But one season doesn't make his driving in the past any worse.

For the Leave me alone thing. I still believe it was marketing trick by Lotus F1.

 

That was milked by Lotus and the amount of t shirts and hats they sold out of it was insane!

I'd agree that Kimi is underperforming this year but I don't think that means his whole career was a waste. He's shown his brilliances in the past. I still regard him as one of the great drivers of the sport but he is in no way one of the top drivers.

 

I like Raikkonen but would not accept either the label of fanboy or apologist. The evidence I go off of is my eyes, and to my eye, his racecraft for Lotus in 2012 and 2013 made him one of the best in the field. I rated him the #4 driver in the field, ahead of the likes of Button and Webber but behind the Alonso/Vettel/Hamilton triumvirate. And my assessment of the engineer's anxiety was my real-time impression watching that race, which I've never seen reason to modify. Lotus were quite surprised to find one of their cars leading and were keen that the driver not screw it up. Raikkonen read between those lines and I think was a little irked to be even implicitly questioned in that way. His reaction was the equivalent of saying "I've got this."

Driver mismanagement was the least of McLaren's problems in 2007, which given how significantly they mismanaged their drivers is really saying something. Both titles should have been theirs, with ease. But the broader point I'd make about Raikkonen is that the "motivation" and "underperforming" labels that attach to him come from people who can't possibly have the data to make those judgments. It's often said he underperformed in 2008 but to my eye he was in it to win it and only had one bad race (Australia) before Ferrari opted to back Massa's title bid over his. That choice didn't come until after Spa and going into that one, Raikkonen was up against it because of France (broken exhaust) and Canada (Hamilton's stupidity). His crashes at Monaco and Spa were quite possibly the result of Ferrari's 2008 chassis having some evil wet-track handling characteristics; let's remember Massa spun his way through the entire race at Silverstone that year. As for 2009, the Alonso move was already in the background and didn't make for a pleasant or productive work environment in the Ferrari garage.

Edit: Not that anything that's transpired since 2009 has made the work environment at Ferrari pleasant or productive. Yet. But that's another topic.

 

^^^Fair assessment.

 

Guys, I think this thread has run it's course, so I decided to create 2015's thread.